John Muir's Birthplace

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Content updated Mon, 19 Jul 1999 23:13:59 GMT

An Infinite Storm of Beauty... [home]

Explorer and Mountaineer

Father and Farmer

Standard Bearer of the World Conservation Movement

Louie Strentzel Muir

"The Alasks book and the Yosemite book, dear John, must be written, and you need to be your own self, well and strong, to make them worthy of you."

Louie Strentzel Muir to John Muir, 8 August 1888

In 1880, age 42, John Muir married Louie Strentzel, the daughter of a Polish doctor who had planted orchards in the Alhambra Valley. Muir's adventures and explorations in the Sierras had allowed him little time for courtship or marriage, but another woman in Muir's life, Jeanne Carr, regarded him as too good a man to be wasted as a bachelor. Jeanne Carr was the wife of Muir's professor at Wisconsin University, and became his intellectual and spiritual mentor. It was she who persuaded him to write about his adventures. It was she who introduced him to Emerson, the artist William Keith and Theodore Roosevelt, and it was she who introduced him to Louie Strentzel. Courtship and marriage soon followed. The couple settled on Dr Strentzel's fruit farm where Muir's botanical knowledge and gardening skills soon made him an expert fruit farmer. The relationship was equally fruitful, and two daughters, Wanda and Helen, were born.

It was inevitable that Muir would become torn by his domestic commitmments, and his beloved mountains and wild places, particularly when he heard stories of the impact of logging and grazing in the high country. The crunch came when he returned to Yosemite in 1889 and saw the destruction for himself. Muir's friends begged him to help establish a conservation movement, but he was no longer a young man and had family and business responsibilities. His health was also affected by the stress caused by these conflicting commitments.

Louie Strentzel Muir was a remarkable woman. She was educated to college level and was an accomplished pianist. She could see for herself the differnt demands on her husband's time and energy and in August 1888, while Muir was off climbing Mount Rainier, she decided to lease or rent much of the land on their fruit farm so that Muir would have less responsibility there, and would be able to concentrate on writing and birthing the conservation movement.

Louie Strentzel Muir died in 1905, John Muir lived until Christmas Eve 1914. They lie together in a small family graveward in Martinez. They are survived by several grandsons, a clan of great-grandchildren, and an emerging generation of great great grandchildren.

The exhibit includes photographs of Louie Strentzel and her daughters along with pictures of the Martinez mansion.